According to those of us deeply involved here and familiar with Stack Overflow, about 7% of comments on Stack Overflow are unwelcoming. What did some unwelcoming comments look like?

“No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.”

“And this is tagged Javascript why?”

“Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something’s gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you’re probably after LEAST(). But don’t do that. Fix your design.”

“For the last time, use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey“

“Please provide a full compilable sample if you want anyone to be able to help you: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. I have already told how you can bind to the property. If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.”

The second example aside, this is what's (supposedly) unwelcoming and what is now banned under to the new code of conduct? We cannot tell people they need to provide an MCVE anymore? That they're obviously doing something wrong they didn't tell us about? That they're not listening to what has been suggested¹? Or that their general approach to a problem is misguided?

Are you kidding me?

Please tell me what we're supposed to be doing instead then. Walk away and don't provide any help at all rather than call a spade a spade?

Update

Apparently the original examples in the blog post have been updated with more generic ones:

According to those of us deeply involved here and familiar with Stack Overflow, about 7% of comments on Stack Overflow are unwelcoming. What did some unwelcoming comments look like? These combine elements of real comments to show typical examples.

“This is becoming a waste of my time and you won’t listen to my advice. What are the supposed benefits of making it so much more complex?”

“Step 1. Do not clutter the namespace. Then get back to us.”

“The code you posted cannot yield this result. Please post the real code if you hope to get any help.”

“This error is self explanatory. You need to check…”

“I have already told how you can… If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.”

Some of these I'd be more on board with (like the first one), but with others (specifically the third one) I'm not. If somebody is lying about their code they need to be told exactly that. We cannot help with fabricated examples that won't demonstrate the actual problem.

It looks like for the last example they just chopped up the comment to remove a bunch of context relevant context that greatly impacts how the comment reads. Honestly that just makes SO look bad in my eyes that they'd resort to something like that.
– ServyJul 10 '18 at 16:22

60

As mentioned below, we should be addressing the issues, all of them, not just one aspect of them. SO (SE?) should be saying 'new users need work harder on their questions and older users need to work on their snark' not 'older users are unwelcoming and here is a tiny amount of one sided data to prove so'. I do believe SO (SE?) made a mistake when trying to address this issue by making it about one side rather than being neutral and trying to work amongst the community to solve the issues on all sides.
– Script47Jul 10 '18 at 16:31

18

@Shog9 but the witch hunt seems to be of a much larger group, the "old" users, this ties in with my comment above, in trying to solve the issue SO (SE?) have started a witch hunt themselves and it seems that a lot of people are quite offended / hurt by that.
– Script47Jul 10 '18 at 16:34

21

See... that's an easy story to tell, ain't it @Script47? The paternalistic "experts are being mean to new users" thing has been cropping up since the day SO launched. But... Is it true? I sure as hell see an awful lot of pretty vile stuff from new users... And that's the point of doing a project like this: separate anecdotes from what's actually happening on the site.
– Shog9♦Jul 10 '18 at 16:40

44

Maybe we should consider the possibility that any comment that isn't an all-out praise or pat-on-the-back for the intended receiver is automatically an unwelcoming comment. IOW, it's impossible to make a comment both useful and welcoming without jumping through creative literary hoops that only experienced writers are capable of.
– MysticialJul 10 '18 at 17:14

27

To me it is a matter of "snarkiness." If a poster made a naive, even "bone-headed" mistake, why assume that they made that mistake knowingly or by apathy. Anyone in the world can post on SO and the best thing we can do to harbor a productive community is to redirect without making someone feel stupid. Making someone feel stupid is communicating the message and adding insult and that last part is superfluous. Let others with cooler heads educate the poster if you can't see fit to yourself. "Snarkiness" can only upset and/or make a poster leave. Is that really what we want?
– John CarrellJul 10 '18 at 17:19

The only comment you'll ever need is, "My responses are limited. You must ask the right question."
– canonJul 10 '18 at 18:07

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@Shog9 Then why aren't the truly vile comments being singled out? Posts like this make it seem like such comments don't actually exist.
– IzkataJul 10 '18 at 18:29

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Respect is something that must be earned, but common courtesy (I think that's what you're actually referring to) is indeed something everyone is entitled to. At first. Courtesy is not in unlimited supply, however, and I don't believe it should be.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 10 '18 at 19:37

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@DavyM What other people want to give freely is for them to decide. What I'm saying is that respect is not something someone can demand from you. Common courtesy is (under normal circumstances).
– Ansgar WiechersJul 10 '18 at 23:00

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@NicolBolas - If examples #3 and #5 (in the original set) are not to be tolerated, then what you're going to see is people refraining from criticising other people's code. There is nothing, repeat NOTHING, that can reasonably be considered a personal attack in those two examples. When I see comments like yours ("these kind of "mild" comments are not considered "mild" and won't be tolerated"), I get worried. Because if criticizing someone's design or asking for the real code is going to be considered equivalent to a personal attack, experienced coders are just going to stop helping people.
– rmunnJul 11 '18 at 8:16

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Just stop commenting completely, someone will always be offended, only flag and close - and then see how welcoming it will to new users that the question will be closed or simply be ignored without any helpful comment.
– luk2302Jul 11 '18 at 9:28

26

I would rather see someone get the message that they should never use non-parameterized SQL because several people were really adamant (even snarky!) about it, and walk away a better programmer, than making sure they don't get their feelings hurt.
– Lukas GrafJul 11 '18 at 9:38

57

I really don't think "“The code you posted cannot yield this result. Please post the real code if you hope to get any help.” is unwelcoming... They're clear, concise and even say please! Aren't there any better examples to use?
– dwironyJul 11 '18 at 20:50

20 Answers
20

There is clearly a diversity of opinion among the the people who participated in the comment-evaluation exercise as to what it means for comments to be "unwelcoming". This is demonstrated by the breadth of the result distributions: that aspect of the results is not plausibly explained by differences in interpretation of the subject text alone. This is a problem that we really need to sort out, because we're going to have a hard enough time moving forward even when we all define the problem the same way.

And indeed, that seems really to be what this question is asking about. Whether the examples should be considered unwelcoming depends on what we mean by "unwelcoming". Plausible working definitions of an unwelcoming comment include those that

expressly convey to the intended receiver that they themselves are not welcome to participate in the community, or

demean or harass the receiver, or

convey to the intended receiver that specific content (question, answer, or comment) they provided is not welcome in the community, or

are prone to be perceived as negative by the receiver, or

are susceptible to being perceived as negative by the receiver, or

may make the receiver feel unwelcome, or

are not "nice" (by some possibly subjective measure), or

are impolite (by some possibly subjective measure), or

are not sufficiently positive.

Choose one or more, and feel free to add your own. My own list includes only a few of those.

Moreover, inasmuch as "welcoming" is pretty meaningless without the context of a "to", it is important to acknowledge that different communities have different expectations and standards. Stack Overflow (SO) self-describes as a "site for professional and enthusiast programmers." I have every reason to expect members of such a community to adopt a different attitude and tone than, say, folks over at Arts & Crafts SE.

I welcome you to SO in part by treating you like a professional or enthusiast programmer. That doesn't mean others are unwelcome, but they might very well feel like they don't fit in. And although I strive to be nice, and I'm prepared to help others fit in, I do not accept that it is incumbent on me or on us to deeply change the nature of the SO community and culture to make people who are not in SO's target audience comfortable here.

With respect to the particular comments highlighted in the revised blog post,

“This is becoming a waste of my time and you won’t listen to my advice. What are the supposed benefits of making it so much more
complex?”

The context indicates that the commenter has engaged the OP in a discussion of the question, including one or more recommended courses of action. That seems welcoming to me. If we are to take the comment at face value, the OP is ignoring the commenter's recommendations for no clear reason. That's boorish. Yes, the comment strikes a negative tone and criticizes the OP. Yes, that might make the OP feel unwelcome. And I'm totally fine with boors feeling unwelcome. The OP here has worn out their welcome.

“Step 1. Do not clutter the namespace. Then get back to us.”

That's curt, certainly. And it's not much help to an OP who does not understand what "cluttering the namespace" means or why it's a bad thing. The commenter is without doubt criticizing the OP's question. But does that make it "unwelcoming"? I don't much care for the comment, but I don't think I'd call it "unwelcoming", and I don't think it rises to a level that we ought to be concerned with.

“The code you posted cannot yield this result. Please post the real code if you hope to get any help.”

Those may literally be my own words. I know at least once I've posted a comment very much to that effect. The main thing I find to criticize in it is the use of the word "hope", which carries the implication that maybe the OP won't get any help regardless. But that was the point, at least in the instance I'm thinking about from my own history. Posting a question on SO does not entitle anyone to help, and if that aspect of our community makes someone feel unwelcome then I'm not a bit concerned about it.

Coming at that after not having just invested my time in analyzing the code presented and comparing it to the output presented, only to discover that the question makes impossible claims about them, I might phrase it more gently. Maybe, "The code you posted cannot yield the result you claim. If you have a question about a program that did produce the result then please edit your question to present that program instead." Nevertheless, if indeed the original comment is my own, then I do not apologize or accept any fault for it.

“This error is self explanatory. You need to check…”

I may not have written those exact words, but I'm sure I have written similar comments. Although what's "self explanatory" to one person is not always so to another, sometimes an error message really doesn't leave anything to be explained, at least to someone who is genuinely an enthusiast (or professional) programmer. Questions that the OP should have been able to answer for themselves indeed are not welcome at SO, and I am perfectly satisfied with that. If an OP is hurt by having that conveyed to them then my compassion for them is limited.

“I have already told how you can… If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.”

And I've written comments using some of those words, too. I won't claim the whole thing, but I'm sure most active members have been in the situation it evokes for me: you've answered their question (that's pretty welcoming); they've asked for clarification, and you've provided it (that's welcoming); they've asked the same thing a different way, and you've answered (that's welcoming); and then they insist it doesn't work for them, even though you have tested the very code or approach you provided. The OP is either doing something wrong or flat out lying. Calling them out on it is an effective and appropriate means to bring the situation to a resolution, and resolving the OP's problem is welcoming, too.

In my experience, such a comment is usually followed by an OP response along the lines of "oops, I copied your code wrong". Problem solved! All is now right with the world. Why is this something to be concerned about? If it's unwelcoming to call out someone's error, then "welcoming" is not a trait that SO can sustain.

I am not a helpdesk operator, and I reject any expectation that I should behave like one. I prefer to be nice, by which I mean gentle, helpful, friendly, patient, and kind. IMHO, I'm good at it, though by no means perfect. If SO wants to welcome behavior from others that tends to elicit non-nice behavior from me, then we may need to re-evaluate our relationship. You can keep the ring, but the cat's coming with me.

I am not a helpdesk operator, and I reject any expectation that I should behave like one. This line summarizes my reservations about the whole "Welcome Wagon" thing perfectly. Thank you.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 12 '18 at 19:00

3

@John: "In my experience, such a comment is usually followed by an OP response along the lines of "oops, I copied your code wrong"." In my experience, such a comment is pretty much never resolved that way. When things get to the "I already told you what to do" point, things never get better. Either the OP walks away, the poster walks away, or the OP/poster get into a fight. Learning has stopped by this point.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 21:59

3

@John: "If we are to take the comment at face value, the OP is ignoring the commenter's recommendations for no clear reason. That's boorish." What is the point of meeting boorish behavior with some from yourself? Disengage and move on. Nobody's asking you to be polite to such a person, but if things have gotten to the point where you feel someone is wasting your time, stop talking to them. Nothing you say will help, and you will accomplish nothing more than making yourself feel better.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 22:01

2

"But does that make it "unwelcoming"?" ... yes. Without context, I can't comment on the accuracy of the comment. But unless the user's problem comes because they are cluttering the namespace, drawing attention to it is unhelpful. Now, as a C++ programmer, I see questions all the time where using namespace std; is used. But the right way to handle seeing that in someone's code is to say it's not a good idea and then link them to the question explaining why.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 22:03

23

I stipulated that the "do not clutter the namespace" comment is unhelpful, @NicolBolas, but as I said, that does not rise to the level of "unwelcoming" to me. That you disagree underscores my first point, that the community hasn't even a consensus on what "unwelcoming" behavior is or how to recognize it. Is it unwelcoming that you comment on this very answer to contradict me three times? That's rhetorical, of course. I do not consider your comments unwelcoming, but that's because of my expectations for this forum, not because of the comments' content or how they make me feel.
– John BollingerJul 13 '18 at 13:03

TL;DR: Most of these can be shortened to remove what sounds like frustration. One of them really doesn't need to be posted at all. They really don't need to be deleted, just potentially edited to remove a line or two. I wouldn't actually reword any of them.

If you can't say something without adding a bit of sass to the end... Yeah, best not to help and just walk away.

Honestly, some of these are a little more hostile than needed. They can be re-worded to be less hostile, and more welcoming.

No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.

Honestly, the main problem I see with this one is the second half. Calling something a waste of your time instead of walking away is always unwelcoming. You don't have to answer when someone replies, and you don't have to provide help if they aren't willing to accept it. Without seeing the rest of the chain, as the other user definitely had to have this user fed up by this point, the best I can say is leave the first two sentences, and then walk away. That would make this less hostile, and therefore more welcoming.

And this is tagged Javascript why?

Without context, there's really no way to reword this one. The better comment to leave would have been to ask how JavaScript is involved in the problem, and re-tag if it's not (while politely explaining how tags should be used, in the edit summary most likely) or just remove the tag without the snarky question. Of course, from your question, it seems you see how this one isn't that great yourself.

For example of a better way to ask this:

Hey, you tagged this JavaScript, but I don't see any in your question. If the problem doesn't involve, or seem to involve, your JavaScript code, it's best we remove that tag so that the right people see your question and can help with it. If it does involve JavaScript, can you share that code with us too, so we can better answer the question?

Or... Just retag it. Really, it's faster and less hassle.

Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something’s gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you’re probably after LEAST(). But don’t do that. Fix your design.

Really, the only thing I see wrong with this comment is it doesn't try to educate the user for why the design must be wrong. They could have linked something, explained it, whatever. And if the user must use that design, for whatever reason, then this comment is only help for the "you're probably after LEAST()" part... Which would really better be put as an answer. Saying someone's doing something "very, very wrong" without explaining how or why it's wrong, and especially just assuming it's wrong, is... Well, most people don't like it.

Imagine I saw you and how you were dressed, and said that if you're wearing that shirt, you can be sure your wardrobe options must be very, very wrong. You... Would probably not appreciate me very much. This is very similar to that.

For the last time, use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey

"For the last time" implies impatience and irritation, not always at the same time. If the user here really wanted to repeat themselves and ignore DRY principles, they could have toned it down a bit:

As said above, you want to use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey

Doesn't that sound a bit more neutral? And if they didn't explain why above, they really should expand on why. Preferably in an answer, if this comment wasn't to suggest improvements to an answer. Really, if this was posted on a question, it should've been skipped and gone to an answer, but that's not the point of the question here.

Please provide a full compilable sample if you want anyone to be able to help you: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. I have already told how you can bind to the property. If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.

I think the only really "unwelcoming" part here is the last sentence. Of course they're doing something wrong, that's why they came here for help in the first place! No one needs to be told they're doing something wrong if they can't make it work. It could be that this user's prior explanation was insufficient or unclear. It's also true that if they were able to provide that much of an answer to the user's question... Did the user truly not have enough of an MCVE, or was this user just pushing for more than was needed? Unfortunately, without more context around this comment,t here's nothing more we can say. Leaving off the last sentence would have gone a long way towards making this better.

At the end of the day, yes, sometimes it's better to just walk away and let someone else handle the help from there. To be fair, most of these comments read as if they're from later in the chain, after at least one attempt to help. In those cases, I feel the real problem is just burnout and frustration of the comment poster.

In that case, yes, if you're getting annoyed or frustrated with a user you've already provided some help to, walk away. There's no point talking at a wall that doesn't want to listen, and if they do want to listen and just aren't getting it... Well, getting frustrated with them is never going to help them get it. Let someone else take a crack at it, or they may just search something you said that might lead them to the solution or understanding they needed.

Are these comments deplorable and outright atrocious? No, not really. Are they a bit more confrontational than need be? Yeah, a little. Can that make people upset? Oh, most definitely. Do these need to be deleted? I think it will depend. Some of these, no, they just need a sentence removed and not really reworded. In those cases, a mod could simply remove the unhelpful part and leave the rest, preferably. The second one really doesn't provide anything useful, so I'd say delete it and go, but otherwise it's a careful balance to strike.

Mods will have to act on these on a case-by-case basis. Hopefully, they will take/have the time to do that, rather than the current "If the comment has some reason it might need to be deleted, just delete it and go" style they use. At least I'm sure most of us can agree these comments don't warrant a scolding, more just a friendly, "Hey, if you're annoyed, it's probably less annoying to you and less a waste of your time to just walk away and let someone else handle it" whether from a mod or another user.

Post blog update

The comments the blog updated with are much more... Generically not welcoming. I only disagree with a couple of them, but... They also have the problem of no context. We can see several that are supposed to have had extra parts, but don't. The examples they've changed to are now stock and not actual examples of what they saw. The blog even calls out that they're typical of what's seen, not what was actually used.

I won't break those comment examples down here, both as this answer is long enough and as the new examples are not the data that was actually used. I won't use my time to analyze them when they aren't specifically what the team analyzed. Actually, I'd be much happier if they gave us the full sample set they used, and what votes each got. All data anonymized, of course, but this will give us a much clear picture of where the team in general stands.

I have a feeling the second comment was from a question posting Java code, which as you said should've just been edited.
– GeorgeJul 10 '18 at 14:57

11

You'd be amazed the number of students or foreign individuals looking for help with java, that tag javascript. It's practically an all day job just closing them, I get them getting frustrated, and the comment doesn't help, nor should it be considered "unwelcoming". It's a total opportunity for dialog.
– TrasivaJul 10 '18 at 15:04

158

This post is effectively saying that all comments will be interpreted as uncharitably as possible, so you need to write out something 5x longer than needed with super fluffy language to combat that, rather than simply being concise and expecting readers to treat the comment professionally. I think that's an unreasonable expectation.
– ServyJul 10 '18 at 15:16

77

@Servy Actually... A number of my suggestions were to write less rather than reword to write more. The only one I really insisted needs expanded, if you really want to post it rather than just retag, doesn't have much more than a "Are you dumb?" style question. Only reason to expand any of the others is to provide more information, and therefore be more helpful to everyone, not to make things fluffy.
– KendraJul 10 '18 at 15:18

47

@Servy "If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong." How is this important information? "This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress." The only part about this remotely helpful is the part about string allocation being needed to make progress. You can leave off the rest and say, "Finding out how the string is allocated will help." There. Same information, less hostility. I still fail to see where I'm advocating making things fluffy and longer.
– KendraJul 10 '18 at 15:29

9

'Hey, you tagged this JavaScript, but I don't see any in your question[...]?' - This is extremely fluffy, you should not be expected to help write the question, include the relevant information and answer the question. There has to be some sort of effort from the questioner's side too which is where I feel we are lacking discussion on.
– Script47Jul 10 '18 at 15:31

29

There is nothing unreasonable about any of the assessments made here. For the sake of making a point: "Would it kill you to refrain from typing or at least deleting those bits of exasperation and ire before submitting your comment?"
– BoltClock♦Jul 10 '18 at 15:55

54

@Heretic Monkey: I don't think it takes any mental gymnastics to interpret any of these comments harshly. You try talking to everyone like that in person and see if any of them remain friendly with you for more than five minutes.
– BoltClock♦Jul 10 '18 at 16:06

17

@Kendra but that is precisely my point, we should be addressing the issues, all of them, not just one aspect of them. SO (SE?) should be saying 'new user need work harder on their questions and older users need to work on their snark' not 'older users are unwelcoming and here is a tiny amount of one sided data to prove so'.
– Script47Jul 10 '18 at 16:09

14

@BoltClock I see similar language used in my work constantly, from lots of different people. Everyone stays quite friendly. I've only ever seen people try to take offense to comments like those on the internet.
– ServyJul 10 '18 at 16:17

28

@Servy: I can't imagine expressions of impatience like "For the last time" and "Would it kill you" being friendly unless they're being used ironically (maybe they are in your case, which is fair enough).
– BoltClock♦Jul 10 '18 at 16:32

10

@Jo. BoltClock's point was specifically that anyone saying such a thing in "real life" and not on the internet, would result in it being received poorly. I was providing experimental evidence (rather than just theory) that that is not the case. And as has been said, I don't see such comments as mean. You're claiming that those comments are being mean. I see no such thing, nor do quite a lot of others.
– ServyJul 10 '18 at 16:33

31

@Bolt - yes, it would kill them. SO is a relentless source of exceedingly bad practices. Surely you've seen your share of questions at which you thought "jeez, I hope nobody ever read this and assume it is a good idea". When you can't explain why it is not then there are just not a lot of decent ways to stop that. Even not responding to comment is a big problem since it looks like you give in and agree. They'll have to care less, pretty hard to do for a dedicated contributor. This is apt to turn into the summer of love disaster number 2, a lot less users that care.
– Hans PassantJul 10 '18 at 16:46

11

@Servy: It doesn't matter who's using or citing these examples. They're all examples. And as you've pointed out, these expressions aren't offensive or rude, but at the same time neither are they necessary to get a point across. I disagree that A making their impatience with B as conspicuous as possible is solely B's fault. I certainly didn't need to spell out in 20 words my frustration with people not reading error messages in their entirety, as annoying as it is and even if I'll never know why the asker didn't in that specific case.
– BoltClock♦Jul 10 '18 at 16:47

16

Not sure if this has been addressed but - isn't this becoming unwelcoming of non-native English folk? I can appreciate that 'And this is tagged Javascript why?' might not be the absolute nicest way to phrase something, but I've worked with many great developers who learned English as a 2nd or 3rd language and it very closely matches their writing style. Maybe a bit direct, but certainly not wrong, insulting or unfriendly (IMHO).
– Rob P.Jul 12 '18 at 14:57

Honestly, a lot of those comments provide more specific guidance and read much kinder than what I see daily in my error logs. Programmers who get their feelings hurt by these types of comments will certainly be devastated when the parser says something to them like:

PHP Fatal error: You have an error in your SQL syntax; check the manual that corresponds to your MySQL server version for the right syntax to use

Totally unhelpful and snarky! Check the manual?!? Seriously people, toughen up. Is the tone & language used by your platform's error reporting going to be an obstacle to advancing your skills as well? Being barked at in an unhelpful and uncaring manner is part of our culture. No apologies.

This is indeed one of the arguments occasionally iterated here: compilers don't show compassion to you, they just point the errors out, some better than others. However, our users are not compilers, and will not always phrase things in a way that a compiler would. In fact, none of the generic examples above would be a compiler's output.
– E_net4Jul 11 '18 at 21:23

13

This could be shortened to "Grow some balls", but it does make a valid point: If such comments upset or disturb someone emotionally, he'll have much bigger problems in life than those that can ... ehm... are supposed to be fixed by some Q/A-site-policy. (Although we also all know that some error messages can cause the strong desire to give the responsible developer a high five ... in the face ... with a chair)
– Marco13Jul 11 '18 at 21:39

9

I feel like this is an incredibly unhelpful post that does nothing to actually get at the heart of the problem. Yes, the given blog examples suck, but I feel you're basically saying that all levels of rudeness are acceptable because it's 'part of our culture'.
– FroopyJul 11 '18 at 21:50

41

@Froopy What is the heart of the problem, though? That's what all the welcoming-discussion is about. For some people, the problem is some vague form of "unwelcomingness". For others, the problem is that unrealistic and counterproductive expectations are made regarding "politeness and being welcoming", without even a speck of evidence that the usual computer scientist parlance actually is a problem, or that the established policies will do more good (politeness) than harm (lower quality). They will not achieve the utopia that they are looking for, that's for sure.
– Marco13Jul 11 '18 at 22:30

6

@Froopy - I'm sorry if I did not make myself clear, I'm definitely not saying that "all levels of rudeness are acceptable". I've seen rudeness that I felt was totally unacceptable but it's far and few between. I was specifically answering the OP's question regarding the examples given in that blog post and I don't really find any of those problematic. To me, a low level of snippiness here is perfectly fine, if not beneficial.
– billynoahJul 11 '18 at 22:44

3

I think that snark or 'snippiness' is unhelpful on a site like SO. The point is for people to get help learning. They will make stupid mistakes (sometimes repeatedly) and some users are not fluent in English. Adding barbs just makes them less likely to admit their mistakes in the future. This uncaring mannerism is part of our developer culture, because our culture is flawed. Just because something is part of our culture does not make is right or good.
– Kyle AJul 12 '18 at 12:37

19

Granted, compilers tend to be rude, but (as others have pointed out above) the problem with a lot of these comments is not their shortness, but their longness. They include phrases that have nothing to do with the problem, but are only there to express exasperation. If you think they're writing like a parser, then imagine your parser saying this: PHP Fatal error: You have an error in your SQL syntax for the 5th time today. I've repeatedly suggested checking the manual, but at this point it seems like a waste of time, so I'll save my breath. Best of luck to you.
– Ryan LundyJul 12 '18 at 12:59

2

@Marco13, I would agree that some people do have unrealistic expectations when it comes to interactions on here. However, I would also say that at times, people could stand to be a little more courteous to others on here. Basically, talking to people instead of at/down to them would be helpful. I do see examples of that every once in a while. I'm not saying it happens everywhere all the time, but it does happen, and when people see that, boom, there's your unwelcoming feeling. That's what I feel like the heart of the matter is, IMO.
– FroopyJul 12 '18 at 13:39

@Froopy I'm trying to be pragmatic here. If a comment is "rude or abusive", then flag it. Anything more to say about that? Yeah, let's discuss about politics, attitudes and feelings and other things that are totally unrelated to the goal of the site, and finally establish a CoC that is so elaborate that hardly any newbie will read it anyhow. At least it keeps the "Culture and Experience" staff busy. I honestly don't see the point of the whole discussion, despite reading and following the discussions for hours and hours. For me, the (reasonable!) "Be nice" policy has just grown out of hand.
– Marco13Jul 12 '18 at 14:02

3

@Marco13 "establish a CoC that is so elaborate that hardly any newbie will read it anyhow." That's the thing; a lot of the time I see people reacting to newbies posting lazy questions who've not read the FAQ, taken the tour, or spent the time seeing if their question fits in here or if they're just treating the site like all the other naff forums on the net. Perhaps if there was a "newbie needs to see how the site works, make this question go away until they perform some captcha-like proof they understand what we're about" button then a lot of this alleged unpleasantness could be avoided.
– user146043Jul 12 '18 at 15:45

1

On a product I used to work on, we got a request from the field to change the name of one of our tools. I don't remember what it was exactly, but it went something like "Interactive Data Input Output Tool" which, when abbreviated in the logs said "IDIOT ERROR:" And the errors were only occurring when the customer had put in invalid input, as the output couldn't be generated. For some reason, they didn't enjoy seeing that when looking through the logs.
– Davy MJul 12 '18 at 19:44

2

@Marco13 "What is the heart of the problem, though?" The very same thing that is the heart of the frequent "StackOverflow is not nice enough" discussion that is lead since many years: the answerers want the questioners to abide by the rules and show effort and the questioners want easy and quick help and be treated nicely. On top of that we are all only humans and some of us seem to have a bad day from time to time. So far, simple solutions haven't shown any effect.
– TrilarionJul 12 '18 at 21:30

@RyanLundy Some professional compilers really do have that degree of sass, check out these error messages from Apple's MPW C compiler. One of the gems? "Too many errors on one line (make fewer)"
– Davy MJul 14 '18 at 23:09

Whoa SO, slow down a moment.

Where was this? How was it advertised? WAS it advertised? This intro page sure looks like it was meant to pull in a large sample of people from Stack Overflow to get involved. I sure as heck have never seen this before.

We had 57 participants

Oh, no apparently it was not advertised or even openly available. Heck, this doesn't even cover a quarter of SO's own employees (much less the 120,000 or so people who've gained at least 100 rep this year).

I have a feeling that more people (and more comments) should have been involved in this ratings process. Because of the fact that tone, in text, is a matter of interpretation you need to get a wide spectrum of readers to participate. I would even then break down the results by age of the account to see if there's an interpretation difference between new users and "old foagies."

On top of that, identifying the comments that 99% of folks thinks are fine, but That One Guy rated as frustrated or angry. Because the problem isn't that people make rude comments (those people can be dealt with), it's the new user who sees a comment, interprets the worst, and leaves telling his two friends "Stack Overflow sucks, they're all elitist jerks" because someone asked him to provide a MCVE. Fixing that is your stated goal, isn't it? Rather than punishing the commenter: teach the reader. Find a way to inform this person that "no, that comment isn't rude, our site has guidelines for asking good questions, and this person is trying to inform to that fact."

Then we get this chart:

This looks pretty typical, lots of abusive comments, some less than ideal comments, and some that are fiiiii--wait a minute! What was that vertical axis labeled again? "Number of raters." As in the number of people who rated the comment. Several of these have 1 or 2 ratings, most have less than ten!

How is this graph even statistically significant?

And now that I look at the name of the X axis, I'm not even sure what kind of data this chart is even supposed to be showing. "100% of comments with each rating" had 7 raters...huh? What does that even mean? How does a comment get a single rating that leaves it at "75%"? Even if we assume that the X axis is supposed to be "acceptability" or "average of all ratings" the choices are "outright hostile" "unsure" and "fine." A single entry of any one of those should not leave a comment at "75% fine."

Now you have me convinced that you're deliberately trying to deceive the community. For what purpose, I don't know, but I know that Stack Overflow knows how to analyze data and present good charts; you have been doing it for years with the developer survey. This on the other hand...this is really sloppy. I don't know what to say.

I've been staring at the graph for 10 minutes and here's what I think it is saying: 6 people marked 100% of the comments as "fine", 1 person marked 75% of the comments as "fine", 51 people marked 0% of the comments as "abusive", etc.
– bmm6oJul 12 '18 at 15:54

1

So one observation is that the raters couldn't decide on how many posts were unwelcoming - the orange distribution is w-i-d-e
– bmm6oJul 12 '18 at 15:57

@AnsgarWiechers Oh good point, I'll go put this over there. That's what happens when I follow a promoted link in the side bar and run across this particular blog post for the first time. ;)
– Draco18sJul 12 '18 at 16:02

2

BTW, am I the only one who thought "EvaluaTron 5000™" when seeing that evaluator screenshot? Have people already forgotten how that game ended? For a moment I had actually thought this was a misplaced April Fools' joke.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 12 '18 at 16:23

5

Maybe they could only find 57 people who've never used SE before.
– canonJul 12 '18 at 16:35

2

Or the results were secretly pre-filtered, removing (most of) those which don't fit the narrative.
– Sarge BorschJul 14 '18 at 9:50

@SargeBorsch That is a bit of a stretch. Even though I disagree with a lot about this "Welcome Wagon" initiative I'd be quite hesitant to make that kind of accusation (or even assumption) without at least some kind of evidence.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 14 '18 at 16:38

@AnsgarWiechers I only mentioned that this could be possible. Because it is obviously possible (in physical/mathematical sense). Because we were not observing the entire process to verify if all steps were done fairly and thus to eliminate that possibility. I don't see why is this necessarily a stretch. In real life all kinds of voting get cheated all the time unless there are enough concerning eyes to detect if someone does something suspicious.
– Sarge BorschJul 15 '18 at 14:21

They weren't cited due to not being good English. They were cited for being inappropriate. The phrasing of the Javascript one is needlessly aggressive; the neutral way to ask is "Where is the JavaScript code?" or something to that effect. The "this error is self explanatory" simply doesn't need to be there. It too is aggressive, suggesting that the OP can't understand something that explains itself.
– Nicol BolasJul 11 '18 at 13:46

34

@NicolBolas That's precisely the point. They were cited as being inappropriate, it's very clear that it's not because of the level of english, but for people less fluent in it, it may very well be how they phrase it.
– Félix Gagnon-GrenierJul 11 '18 at 20:59

25

@NicolBolas I have some understanding of Japanese and several of my friends are English as a second language speakers. Though a few have been speaking English long enough to understand the problem with the 1st comment, others wondered why it was bad to say why at the end of the sentence (think or look up desu ka or just ka) - and thought this was a good way to ask it. Not saying this was the case in the original but PoGibas's point should not be disregarded (when thinking of comments in general). I worry SE might be too aggressive in attacking comments which are due to language as well.
– JGreenwellJul 11 '18 at 21:00

3

I find it rather ironic that an answer that talks about English fluency is edited by a native speaker(?) to fix wrong usage of English.
– user9455968Jul 12 '18 at 8:13

3

@LutzHorn I like to think of it more as informing - I did leave a link to an explanation in the edit comment.
– Andrew MortonJul 12 '18 at 8:54

10

@NicolBolas "Where is the JavaScript code?" seems every bit as accusatory as, "Why is this tagged as JavaScript?" Personally, I don't see a problem with either one. I find them roughly equivalent. Even though they're explicitly pointing out a deficiency, I don't find either one particularly combative.
– canonJul 12 '18 at 13:20

I think that fundamentally, all of the examples have one common theme:

The commenter is frustrated. Frustrated with OP, frustrated with too many bad questions, frustrated at all the noise permeating what's supposed to be signal.

This is the principle problem that leads to snarky comments, not a general unwelcoming attitude. If you fix the quality problem or at least put forth more high quality submissions, the frustration and thus snark level is going to decrease. I don't think you can mandate people not be frustrated by fiat, no matter how well written your code of conduct is.

Whether their attitude is unwelcoming or not is irrelevant; what matters is that their actions create an environment that others don't want to participate in. Being frustrated cannot be helped; expressing frustration can be. So being frustrated is no excuse. The goal is not to mandate what people feel; it's to keep them from unproductive expressions of feelings.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 15:00

3

@NicolBolas Why they do what they do is really the only relevant factor because contingent on understanding that are any strategies to abate such behavior.
– MagischJul 12 '18 at 15:04

... Of course you do. If you only treat the symptom... you'll never really solve the problem.
– Kevin BJul 12 '18 at 15:13

7

@NicolBolas Of course I do, because depending on why that is is my entire response to it. If that person is near death and stealing food no amount of threatening to report to police will solve anything there. This is a deliberately over the top example of course, but you can only abate what you understand.
– MagischJul 12 '18 at 15:16

1

@NicolBolas if "you" are designing a system - a justice system in your comment - then YES you care why people commit crimes. It's utterly essential. And likewise if discussing SO/SE policies and systems, it's so important WHY people might leave sub-optimal comments. Some of the examples given by the thought police in the blog post sound so much like the person they are talking to was being a complete jerk. And, if so, moaning at the volunteers answering questions to be nicer to the inconsiderate jerks will just drive away the volunteers
– Stuart WhitehouseJul 12 '18 at 17:11

2

@Magisch: When dealing with statistics, you can care about why some people behave that way. When looking at the crime rate in a population vs. mean income or some other factor, that's important. When looking at a specific act, it is irrelevant. Misbehavior has happened and must be dealt with. Punishment can certainly factor in such considerations, but misbehavior must always be acknowledged as misbehavior.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 17:43

2

@Magisch: Or to put it another way, reducing people's frustrations will reduce the number of people who lash out. But any lashing out still needs to be dealt with.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 17:45

2

@NicolBolas Right, but punishment's purpose is as a deterrent or influencer of action. If you punish someone for something outside of pure restitution, you want a deterrent against future transgressions of the same type. That means your actual goal is influencing behavior. My hunch is that stack overflow mainly wants to improve the user experience for many people who are targeted by such lashing out. It would only behoove them then to first reflect on why people are doing so before going to the traditionally least effective and most time-expensive way of curbing behavior (pure punishment)
– MagischJul 13 '18 at 6:34

I think it's more of a cycle: new users arrive, frustrate people trying to help them, both parties feel wronged, nobody's happy, the site loses the chance of more positive interactions from those users. You can't mandate new users to write good questions by fiat either, so just putting all the blame on them is equivalent to giving up on the whole problem. We need to think of tools that help existing users deal with new users without getting so frustrated, as well as preventing that frustration leading to behaviour that drives new users away.
– IMSoPJul 13 '18 at 8:55

3

@NicolBolas No system of justice that requires perfection is going to work. So "any lashing out still needs to be dealth with" means you are signing yourself up for failure. Rules and consequences guide behavior, they don't determine it; so "why" are people doing X, and manipulating that, is more important than having rules about and punishment for doing X, in reducing the incidence of X.
– Yakk - Adam NevraumontJul 13 '18 at 13:55

1

@Yakk-AdamNevraumont: OK, how about this: any lashing out needs to be seen as rule breaking. Because that's the step we're on at this point. There are a fair number of people who see this lashing out and think "Meh, that's fine" or even "Bravo, give those freeloaders what for!" If we're going to guide behavior properly, we need to make everyone aware that these are against the rules and that there will be consequences for them.
– Nicol BolasJul 13 '18 at 14:15

I'll take a stab at this. Most of them I agree can easily be rewritten or shortened to be nicer/more welcoming:

No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.

This should be phrased:

No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory.

That's all. No snark, no attitude, etc. Just stop right there.

And this is tagged Javascript why?

Hard to tell without context, but it can be better asked:

"Why is this tagged with JavaScript"

or even

"Did you mean to tag this with Javascript?"

or even just remove the tag silently, if you are sure it does not belong (and have 2k+ reputation)

Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something’s gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you’re probably after LEAST(). But don’t do that. Fix your design.

I don't think there is anything wrong with this, but again context is important. In this case, I'd like to see the question and any previous comments to tell. This could be made nicer though by saying:

Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something's gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you're probably after LEAST(). But I would recommend fixing your design first.

It's a little bit nicer but again the change is largely superficial.

For the last time, use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey

Just remove the "for the last time" phrase. It sounds like you are exasperated and accusing the OP of not listening. May be true, but not necessary to point out, and we need more context to judge it effectively.

Please provide a full compilable sample if you want anyone to be able to help you: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. I have already told how you can bind to the property. If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.

Like most of the comments quoted in the blog post, this one is helpful and good, until the end, where the user piles on. Everything after the link should be removed/left out. The first sentence after is just repeating that exasperation tone, and then 2nd one is condescending and unnecessary because obviously if it doesn't work you've done something wrong.

The takeaway here I think is that most people aren't intentionally rude or unwelcoming in comments, they just get that way after trying to help someone who is not quite getting it or who needs more help than commenters expect to give. My advice:

If you find yourself about to repeat what you've said or resort to pithy truisms or retorts, stop commenting and move on.

Hmm. I've got mixed feelings about your take on the first and last comments. While I agree that the end of both of them is a bit snippy, you propose fixing it by outright removing instructions to the user on what to do next - in the first case, to "find out how the string is allocated", and in the last case, to provide an MCVE specifically showing how attempting to use the previously-suggested approach to "bind to the property" fails. I don't really understand what either of those instructions means without context, but I'm cautious about assuming out of hand that they can just be culled.
– Mark AmeryJul 10 '18 at 15:43

11

@MarkAmery In the first comment, it sounds as if the commenter has already said to find out how the string is allocated. Its essentially just a "if you wont do what I already told you, you won't progress". In the second case, the same situation, The MCVE link and instruction is the new info, and saying "I've already told you X" is... just repeating yourself. But I agree, context is important. Really we should be given links or screenshots of the whole context for each comment.
– TylerHJul 10 '18 at 15:47

1

Wish I could upvote you twice. Each of these could be written to be less snarky or more kind, but to get the full picture we'd need to see the whole conversation.
– Nate BarbettiniJul 10 '18 at 15:53

2

Actually IMO a better approach to the "for the last time" comment and the "I have already told you how to bind" comment is not to reword it but just to move on without commenting. Sometimes the OP is just not going to learn how to learn here - even though they've got a million examples in front of them on how to get generous help from strangers - and they're not worth trying to help. I for one believe the original asker needs to put in some effort, just as we're expecting the many potential responders to put in an effort.
– davidbakJul 10 '18 at 21:30

2

@davidbak Yes, if they've already said the important info, I agree moving on/refraining from commenting would be fine. Sometimes repetition is an effective teaching tool, though. It's probably a case of 'best left to the individual's judgment' on those; whether you feel someone might get the message by repeating it once, or whether they won't get it at all no matter how many people tell it to them, is a case-by-case and person-by-person thing. And yes, no one is suggesting askers should get everything they want handed to them without putting in effort of their own.
– TylerHJul 11 '18 at 1:49

6

SO ist not a support system. We don't need to be nice and act like its ok if people act stubborn and ignore us.
– MafiiJul 11 '18 at 10:05

11

@Mafii You do need to be nice, that is what you agreed to when you accepted the terms of this site.
– Mark RotteveelJul 11 '18 at 12:25

4

@MarkRotteveel this should've been "excessively nice". Being nice but firm is what is okay imo, and some of these comments are (nice but firm), unlike the policy is suggesting.
– MafiiJul 11 '18 at 13:03

4

@Mafii It sounds like you are using loaded language, and also trying to prescribe quite a narrow view of what the site is for. The site owners and operators are putting out a very clear message that directly contradicts your personal view. Please keep that in mind when commenting so as to avoid confusing new users by inadvertently telling them wrong information!
– TylerHJul 11 '18 at 13:56

2

@TylerH I see your view. I'm not commenting that way, I just feel like being excessively nice is counter-productive to the sites healthiness over all.
– MafiiJul 11 '18 at 14:40

2

@Mafii I tend to agree; it makes communication cumbersome, especially for programmers, who are notorious for not being adept at communication or social interaction to begin with. Luckily, they aren't saying we have to be "excessively nice". They are only saying we have to stop being rude and unwelcoming. Bridging the chasm of understanding is where we are right now between the people who recognize what that is, and the people who think there is no difference between reducing unwelcoming/snarky behavior and "being excessively nice".
– TylerHJul 11 '18 at 15:12

@MarkRotteveel: Ah. Now that we have the original examples we see that any remotely reasonable projection makes it the new users that the community doesn't really want the real problem.
– JoshuaJul 11 '18 at 21:19

2

@Joshua Your comment doesn't seem grammatically intelligible. Did you leave out a few words or something by mistake?
– TylerHJul 11 '18 at 21:37

5

It's quite pointless to comment on the comments like this, since they are taken out of their context. A fairly common situation on SO is this: Q: How do I implement a binary search tree? [Code] Comment: Your memory allocation is wrong, this will crash because [reason]. And then the OP responds to the comment: "Hi can you tell me how to implement a binary search tree?" (the original question). It is then perfectly reasonable to respond with: "This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the [x] is allocated you can’t make progress."
– LundinJul 12 '18 at 14:48

2

If you just remove the tag silently then the author will keep misusing it, which wastes the time of everyone watching that tag. It's better to get him/her to consider why it might have been wrong to do that.
– Patrick ParkerJul 12 '18 at 15:57

I think what they are trying to get at is that there are nicer ways to say each of those things

“No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.”

This could be said as: “No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. I'm trying to help you understand this, but I feel as if I am not being heard. Would you please find out how the string is allocated?"

“And this is tagged Javascript why?”

"Your question seems to be about java(or whatever language it is really about). JavaScript is a completely different language from Java. Do you believe you could remove the JavaScript tag, or perhaos explain more why JavaScript applies to your question?"

“Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something’s gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you’re probably after LEAST(). But don’t do that. Fix your design.”

"Your error looks like it's coming after LEAST(). However you would avoid this problem if you weren't using enumerated columns. I suggest that you reconsider the design of your program, as if you can avoid enumerated columns, then your design will be much much better."

“For the last time, use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey“

"Again, please use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey"

“Please provide a full compilable sample if you want anyone to be able to help you: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. I have already told how you can bind to the property. If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.”

"Please provide a full compilable sample so that we can help you: [mcve]. Binding to the property should work as I've already said, but if that's not working, show the code and show what you are doing wrong."

However I don't agree that these are unwelcoming!

“No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.”

This doesn't sound like an out-of-the-blue comment, it sounds like someone who was trying to help the user, and the user kept complaining or refusing to provide information. Then the commenter, who could have gotten offended and just left the question asker for being rude and wasting their time, decided instead to try once more to help the asker to understand. They specifically say that they are giving advice, and feel that they are not being listened to, yet still try once more to help the user know that "C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory." This isn't an unwelcoming comment, it's a person really trying to help even though the post owner doesn't listen to them.

“And this is tagged Javascript why?”

I can practically guarantee that this comment was posted to a java question, but someone browsing their favorite tag "JavaScript" clicked on it and started reading only to find that the question had nothing to do with JavaScript. In all honesty, it's rude for people to add tags that don't belong because it wastes the time of people following the other tag only to find that the question has nothing to do with their subject of interest. Just like questions about c++ that aren't compatible with c yet are tagged c. However, we can give the question asker the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they just don't know how tags work, or maybe they're just barely learning java and think JavaScript is the same thing. So instead of assuming that the person is wasting our time, let's just ask them: And this is tagged JavaScript, why? I've provided a slightly more welcoming way of phrasing it for people who don't like to be to the point, but this phrase isn't rude or unwelcoming, it's just to the point.

(I actually have a friend from the Dominican Republic and in Spanish he always uses direct phrases like that. Short and to the point. It's just the culture there, it's how they talk and there's nothing rude about it. He never says something as drawn out as "Tu pregunta parece ser enfocado en el idioma Java. Javascript es otro idioma, completemente distinta a Java. ¿Crees que puedes quitar la etiqueta Javascript o explicar por que es necesario?" when he can just say "Y esta etiqueta de Javascript, ¿que?")

“Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something’s gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you’re probably after LEAST(). But don’t do that. Fix your design.”

Wow. This person told the user exactly where to look (after LEAST() ) to correct the answer, however they took the time to point out an existing issue with the code that is provoking the problem in the first place. If calling out xy problems is rude now, I don't know what to tell you. This isn't unwelcoming, it's giving even more helpful material than the user asked for. It's like going into the -- oh wait I just remembered, I'm really bad at analogies, so I'm not going to try that. But it's good. The comment is good.

“For the last time, use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey“

I'm just going to go out on a limb here and say if there's a last time, then there was probably a first and a second time. If a person isn't listening to you, sure, you can just leave them to wallow in disagreeable ignorance. Or you can do as this commenter did, try one last time to help the user. Where on the internet are you going to find people so bent on helping you that even when you are rude to them and not trying what they suggest, they still stick around and with a civil tone try to make sure you do the right thing?

“Please provide a full compilable sample if you want anyone to be able to help you: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. I have already told how you can bind to the property. If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.”

If we can't tell the user that their question is unanswerable until they provide more information, and if they aren't listening to the suggestions we are giving, then I think we can just do away with comments completely, there's no real point to them. They are for suggesting improvements and asking for clarification as this user has done. The phrase at the end ". If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.”" might be considered rude in isolation, but it was preceded by the request of an MCVE so that the commenter could see what that "something wrong" is and help. Saying "something" isn't vague because the person is being unwelcoming, it's vague because there isn't enough information to guess at what the something could be.

In short, if this is the best sample of unwelcoming comments, then I think Stack Overflow is pretty darn welcoming.

There are always nicer ways to say something. However, I'm not willing to sugarcoat every word I'm saying while I'm trying to help solve somebody else's problem. There is a thing like "nice enough". And like you said, if this is the worst it comes to there shouldn't be any need for action at all.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 10 '18 at 15:24

16

@AnsgarWiechers I think the problem is your idea of "nice enough" is not nice enough.
– barbecueJul 10 '18 at 15:32

13

@AnsgarWiechers You don't have to sugarcoat anything. In fact, all of the example comments can become welcoming by removing words (effort), barring the second one.
– ClintJul 10 '18 at 15:32

2

@DavyM - your last sentence is totally reinforced by the statistic (in the blog post) that only 7% of the (small) sample of comments were judged unwelcoming anyway. That's small.
– davidbakJul 10 '18 at 21:38

1

@davidbak: 7% is not small. Let's say that for every 8 hour period of your life, there's a 7% chance that someone will smack you. Would you consider 7% sufficiently small? The point was made in the blog post that, while it seems small, when you factor in the huge number of users who come to this site, what appears small can still have a large impact. We can do better.
– Nicol BolasJul 11 '18 at 13:49

11

@NicolBolas - Getting smacked by 7 out of 100 strangers I meet would be bad. I don't consider getting smacked by a stranger equivalent to reading any or all of those comments directed at me. Not equivalent in any way. Seriously.
– davidbakJul 11 '18 at 14:06

@davidbak: My point is not to make them equivalent. It's to show that how small 7% of depends entirely on how often you encounter the things that make you roll those dice. If someone doesn't meet strangers very often, 7 out of 100 probably isn't that big of a problem.
– Nicol BolasJul 11 '18 at 16:09

20

"In all honesty, it's rude for people to add tags that don't belong" And there we have the essence of what annoys so many about this "welcoming" project. Question askers are asking experts to answer their questions for free, but do not have the courtesy to provide a clear, complete and correct description of their problem. And the those experts are the only ones being expected to be the only courteous.
– RaedwaldJul 11 '18 at 16:51

1

@Raedwald: I don't see anyone saying that askers of questions are not expected to be courteous. What's being said is that discourtesy should not be met in kind. If someone asks a bad question, or is a jerk towards you, you do not have to do it back to them. Improving the quality of questions is a project actively being worked on; improving the behavior of the community is likewise a project actively being worked on.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 15:04

5

@NicolBolas That's why, after mentioning that what the asker was doing, I said to give them the benefit of the doubt, "so instead of assuming that the person is wasting our time, let's just ask them." This commenter didn't respond rudely, s/he didn't say "Do you not know how tags work?" or "Why are you putting completely irrelevant tags like JavaScript?" or "Do you even know what JavaScript is?" but rather s/he just asked why it was tagged JavaScript. No judgement, no nothing. If you're finding “And this is tagged Javascript why?” as unwelcoming, you're reading into things that aren't there.
– Davy MJul 12 '18 at 17:13

Preface: I'm not defending the study or certain other aspects of how SE is approaching this inclusivity/civility thing. I do think SO (the SE I'm active on) has a civility problem (though much less of one than the internet in general and just about any techncial mailing list I've ever read), and that not contributing to that incivility (which I've been guilty of doing) is worth-while.

We cannot tell people they need to provide an MCVE anymore?

Yes, we can, and just generally we can and should (IMHO) hold questions to a reasonable standard, and point it out when they aren't up to standard. We can do so without being rude, sarcastic, and/or dismissive about it. We can be constructive and engaging. Or we can walk away, which is an option I don't think we exercise nearly often enough.

Let's look at those comments, and then I'll wrap-up with my take on "what we're supposed to be doing instead":

No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.

This comment stream is clearly already in a downward spiral and the commenter is getting frustrated (quite probably with good reason). He/she might want to just walk away. But if they choose not to, trying to raise the tone rather than lower it is their better option. Something like:

No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. Your best bet here is to find out how the string is allocated and take it from there.

And this is tagged Javascript why?

OMG we've all been there. :-) My guess is that comment was on a Java question. Yes, it's really frustrating that people cannot get the distinction between Java and JavaScript, and/or apply tags willy-nilly without bothering to think about what they're doing. It really is. The urge is to slap down the sloppy tagger. And that's the problem: The slap. Instead, maybe:

FYI, although their names are similar, JavaScript and Java are completely different languages. Please do be careful when tagging. (I've fixed it for you.) :-)

Amazing what a smile can do. A smile and removing the blatant sarcasm, that is.

Or if it it was genuinely unclear why it was tagged JavaScript:

Why is this tagged JavaScript? Are you using JavaScript somewhere that's not obvious from the question?

Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something’s gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you’re probably after LEAST(). But don’t do that. Fix your design.

Bluntness in written communication directed at a stranger usually comes across as rudeness. If the commenter wants to constructively help the OP, this is unlikely to be an effective means of doing so. If they don't, again, there's that walk away option.

Perhaps:

It sounds like you're after LEAST(). But I've found that having enumerated columns is generally not a great idea because [short, probably incomplete list of reasons]. So you'd probably be better off revisiting the design to see if there's a way to avoid them.

For the last time, use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey

Another comments thread that's already in a downward spiral. I've made comments like this in the past, and I shouldn't have, and I knew that long before the current Be Nice Mark II.

In this case, if that suggestion isn't in an answer, it probably should be. If there's a reason it can't be, then since the commenter has already told the OP what to do (at least once, from the sound of it), the best option is probably just to walk away.

Please provide a full compilable sample if you want anyone to be able to help you: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. I have already told how you can bind to the property. If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.

No one likes being told they're doing something wrong by a stranger on the internet, particularly when the person telling them that doesn't even know if that's actually true (because they haven't seen it). Perhaps:

Please provide a full compilable sample, it will help us help you; more: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. If you've tried to bind to the property as I described above, it sounds like there's some error in the code doing that, so if you show us that code, we should be able to help you fix it.

Re the updated comments, you specifically called out the third one, saying you didn't see what was wrong with it:

The code you posted cannot yield this result. Please post the real code if you hope to get any help.

It's not that bad, IMHO, but "if you hope to get any help" isn't all that useful. Perhaps:

The code in the question cannot yield this result. Perhaps you accidentally removed the part of it causing the trouble to keep your example short, or missed out a compilaton step, or similar? Please update the question with a Minimal, Complete, and Verifiable example that we can copy and paste to see the problem ourselves, so we can help you fix the problem.

You wrote:

If somebody is lying about their code they need to be told exactly that.

It's not likely that person is lying. It's much more likely that they're mistaken.

None of which answers your main question:

Please tell me what we're supposed to be doing instead then. Walk away and don't provide any help at all rather than call a spade a spade?

FWIW, this is where I've come to after nearly nine years, for a question that isn't up to standard:

In general, I think it's possible initially to say something constructive and engaging. I have several bookmarklets I use for the usual situations (MCVEs, how to ask, etc.) which I hope achieve that. These are usually accompanied by a close vote but not a downvote. (But sometimes both, because sometimes the post justifies both.)

If they reply and there's something further constructive I can say, I'll do so (within limits; I have other things to do :-) ).

If they don't do their part and improve the post, and I'm aware of it (because I stuck around, or they @ pinged me, whatever), I'll usually downvote and walk away. There's no getting around the fact that this happens a lot. There are a lot of people who don't respect SO and the time of SO contributors. I've done my part: I've been friendly, but also (hopefully) clear. They haven't done their part. At this point, if they take that as unwelcoming, well, okay. I'm fine with that.

For particularly egregious posts, I even wait for it to be closed so I can vote to delete. (And I've recently realized I can sometimes accelerate that process by dropping a cv-pls in SOCVR.)

If they do bring their question up to standard (and this happens a lot too, though sadly not as often as the other), I remove my comment, remove my close vote, remove my downvote if any, upvote if the updated question is useful, and either answer, or walk away because I don't know the answer, don't have time to answer, etc.

If the OP is rude or similar, I flag the comment as Rude or Abusive. Then I walk away unless there's a very, very good reason that I should post a reply to the rudeness. For instance, if they rudely point out that I'm wrong about something, and they're right, I might reply acknowledging that (and removing the incorrect comment) but also asking them (politely) not to be rude. (And I probably shouldn't even do that, but...I do. Again: They haven't done their part, so if they find that unwelcoming, well...okay.)

If the OP is unwilling to put in effort, or (bluntly) clueless, or both, I'll stick with it for a couple of rounds if it seems like we might get there, trying to help, but if I'm approaching that "Look, as I said above, do X. If you're not willing to do X, I can't help you." moment, that's a big walk-away trigger. I used to post those comments. I don't anymore. They didn't work anyway, didn't make me feel any less frustrated, and almost certainly ran afoul even the old Be Nice policy. :-)

So when I say that the walking away option isn't used often enough, I don't mean doing so from the outset (though some questions really are just not worth bothering). It's just I've learned that getting involved in long exchanges with someone who isn't being constructive at their end just ends up with me getting frustrated and, sometimes, posting something sarky or even rude that I later regret. So I'm learning to recognize those situations and walk away from them.

In fairness to the folks who confuse Java with JavaScript, Brendan Eich's original "LiveScript" language was renamed to "JavaScript" specifically because Sun Microsystems wanted people to confuse it with Java, for marketing reasons that I don't entirely understand. Ever since, we've been dealing with their continuing success.
– Mark AmeryJul 10 '18 at 16:33

1

@MarkAmery - Indeed. In fact, in my rewrite, I originally had "...names are (intentionally) similar..." but then figured I was distracting from the point. Perhaps I should have kept it. :-)
– T.J. CrowderJul 10 '18 at 16:36

3

As for your proposed rewrites, in a few cases it's non-obvious to me whether the average reader would find them more or less polite than the originals. In particular, throwing in a smiley face risks being taken as patronising, and I can see the "good luck!"s rubbing some people the wrong way - there's a risk that by spelling out what needs doing but then also wishing someone luck doing it, you imply that it's trivial for you but a difficult task for them that you think they might fail at, which then comes across as a put-down. I think I roughly agree that these are improvements, though.
– Mark AmeryJul 10 '18 at 16:41

1

@MarkAmery - Well, not just throwing in a smiley face. Also removing the blatant sarcasm. People can read just about anything as patronizing and sarcastic. My goal these days is to not write patronizing or sarky comments (e.g., knowingly), which hopefully at least reduces the odds of their being read that way.
– T.J. CrowderJul 10 '18 at 16:45

1

A point about "lying" - it's not a big stretch to call it a lie, posting example code that does not exhibit a problem described in the question indeed amounts to making a false statement. But when you call something a "lie", most people think that you are presuming there was an intent to post a lie, and things go downhill from there. I agree that the examples in the blog post are not the best ones to get their point across. But if their point is to stay as neutral as possible when trying to convey the meaning - I agree with it completely.
– artemJul 10 '18 at 17:56

5

Do we really need to cap an ascii-smiley on the end of every comment which could possibly be construed as criticism? It seems like we're reflooring the internet in egg-shells via wanton carebearification. :|
– canonJul 10 '18 at 18:04

2

@canon - When you're interacting with someone directly, the amount of non-verbal communication is huge. So the occasional smiley or similar helps bridge that gap and impart tone. (Now, personally, I think tacking a stream of emojis on the end of a message is OTT, but hey...)
– T.J. CrowderJul 10 '18 at 18:19

1

Everything goes better with something attached to the end of each sentence. Desu.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 10 '18 at 18:23

2

Henceforth, all of my comments will be clearly marked as dead-pan. :|
– canonJul 10 '18 at 18:31

2

Was the current Dalai Lama born out of wedlock?
– TylerHJul 11 '18 at 5:12

3

@AnsgarWiechers - There are definitely some people I don't want to be welcoming to. The problem is I don't know in advance who they are. Example: The no-research, didn't-bother-to-check-docs question. When someone posts one of those, there are at least two possibilities: Person A who knows full well they're trying to get other people to do their work, or Person B who thinks that's what SO is for, people getting rep in return for doing their work. When you call directory enquiries to get someone's phone number (which used to be a free call), they don't reply with "Well, did you look (cont'd)
– T.J. CrowderJul 11 '18 at 9:59

3

(continuing) in the phone book?" They're there for the purpose of doing that for you. SO isn't, but not everyone knows that. So by keeping the tone high when we tell them that, we educate Person B without belittling them. There's nothing we can do about Person A other than eventually question-ban or even IP-ban them. And there will always those people regardless of how we comment; they're immune to sark. Maybe SE can cut down on their rubbish with a question template, maybe not, but we aren't going to with sarky comments that slide off Person A but hurt and discourage Person B.
– T.J. CrowderJul 11 '18 at 9:59

2

I agree with all of that. What I'm trying to say is: we're already doing.what you describe. We're trying to educate person B. But it's person A who is complaining about how "unwelcoming" SO is, which is what lead to the "Welcome Wagon". The part I probably disagree most with in the infamous "SO isn't welcoming enough" blog post is the assertion "we know it's true, because they tell us". Just because somebody tells you they feel one way or the other doesn't mean they actually have a reason to feel that way. Or that they're even telling you the truth in the first place.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 11 '18 at 10:16

1

@AnsgarWiechers - Yeah, well, there were a few issues with that blog post. :-) And that bit in particular was...poorly-judged. But I don't need them to tell us; I see it for myself in the unfriendly, sarky, unwelcoming comments on newbie questions that I still see every day. (And on answers and...) From the sound of it, you're not someone posting those comments. I used to be, and there are still plenty who are. I'm probably not on the same page as SE on a lot of this, but I do agree that that behavior needs to be changed.
– T.J. CrowderJul 11 '18 at 10:31

While many people might see this as a sudden change, I found that the blog post tended to reflect how comments have been flagged over the years that I've been a moderator. Almost all comments are fine. Truly abusive comments are relatively easy to identify, and you have a strong consensus as to what they are (the tight clustering in their study). And then there's the "unwelcoming" ones we're talking about here.

The broad distribution on the "unwelcoming" case is to be expected. Different people have different views as to what crosses the line, as can be seen in the arguments in the comments and answers here about the cases they highlight.

Comments like each of the ones above (as well as the new composite comments they edited into the post) have regularly been flagged by the community. In the past, many comments like this would have been flagged as "not constructive", but now we see them getting flagged as "no longer needed" or sometimes "rude and abusive". If we pulled a list of comments flagged in this manner over the years, I bet you'd see many that look similar to what they highlight in the post.

To me, it isn't shocking to see the results of a study like this, because that's how people have flagged things over the years. Stack Exchange themselves employed Mechanical Turk to look at comments during the Summer of Love project and found outside people rating comments in a similar manner.

Comments like this are going to continue to be flagged, I don't think this study will change that much. Kendra's answer provides excellent suggestions for how to reword them to alter tone while preserving information, which I think is a worthwhile goal, flags or not.

What is done in response to those flags is another topic, and not something I'll get into here, but I wanted to point out that in my years moderating the site I've seen a very similar distribution to what you see in that study.

What is done in response to those flags is another topic But that is the part that actually concerns me, particularly in the light of the new code of conduct.
– Ansgar WiechersJul 10 '18 at 16:56

31

IOW, any comment that isn't a pat-on-the-back/positive-reinforcement is automatically unwelcoming.
– MysticialJul 10 '18 at 16:59

1

@Mysticial I certainly hope we are not required to pat backs here. I just read the COC and my understanding is that as long as we do not add negativity, all is well. Perhaps it would be better if they clarify that neutral is good.
– AnneTheAgileJul 10 '18 at 18:26

Clarifying; it might be nice [or not] for people to give pat-on-the-back/positive-reinforcement , but I do not think it is necessary. External reinforcement can even be, but is not always, unhelpful. The best is to help questioners arrive at the place of their own internal satisfaction, pride, self-respect, and self-motivation that arises naturally from solving problems . Our part in this is to offer them respect.
– AnneTheAgileJul 10 '18 at 18:44

14

@AnneTheAgile - That's odd, I thought our part in this was to offer them answers. In fact, I kind of thought that in answering at all - something which takes time and effort - the respect was implicit: The asker wasn't ignored, but was taken seriously and was therefore worth taking the time and effort to answer.
– davidbakJul 10 '18 at 21:35

Maybe you can help elevate this to a new question/etc @davidbak , but imho the goal is to offer respectful answers, as opposed to offering disrespectful answers. Maybe you think I think all the above items listed by OP are disrespectful. I do not.
– AnneTheAgileJul 11 '18 at 16:05

Different people have different views as to what crosses the line That's...precisely...the problem I have with the proposed CoC...
– Draco18sJul 11 '18 at 23:51

3

@Draco18s: Different people have different views as to what is or isn't "nice". I'm sure many people see the comments here as perfectly "nice", while many others don't. So the Be Nice policy is no less subjective. After all, as Brad points out, comments like these have been flagged previously and removed previously. So they were often considered to violate Be Nice.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 15:12

No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.

I'm fairly sure I wrote this comment.

For sure it is snarky. And it would be better without the snark.

Of course, the multiple previous comments that were posted without the snark, that were ignored by the asker, weren't offered up as context. As so many other answers and comments here point out, the snark is a response to frustration. It's not a good response, but it is a human response.

Was it unwelcoming? That's really a moot point. This comment was made way after the welcome stage. Then the asker was made perfectly welcome but for whatever reason was unable to heed the advice that they sought. Certainly my efforts were treated as being unwelcome!

It's a little ironic that so little seems to be done to make life easier for this site's most valued asset - its providers of content. Why is so much effort expended on those who flood the site with poor content and so little on those who try to curate? Perhaps I'm wrong on this one, but that's how it feels to me.

Suppose these welcome wagon efforts succeed and we train our experts to disengage as soon as we encounter askers that don't want to listen or heed advice to clarify and improve posts. What then? Will the asker feel any more happy about the transaction? Nope. They will feel frustrated that they didn't get their answer and that the question was ignored.

My honest belief is that the majority of askers who come away feeling unhappy with their experiences here cannot be pleased. Their expectations are unrealistic and can't be met.

I hope I am wrong, but I have little hope that this site will be able to satisfy its goal of curating high quality questions and answers, whilst at the same time ensuring that everybody who posts here feels happy with the interactions.

I've been a victim of your snark David but the points that you made in the snark that you have dealt me were valid and so I corrected my post accordingly to try to improve its quality. But I'd like to make it clear that the snark is not appreciated and indeed feels unwelcoming. Where you might have a point is some people are motivated by negative criticism. But I still think kindness can rule the day.Point out shortcomings in a kind way and leave it at that. If the poster really wants more they'll have to comply.
– Jonathan ElkinsMar 12 at 7:24

@Jonathan I agree and I think I acknowledged that in this answer.
– David HeffernanMar 12 at 7:35

This might be an interesting analysis to do on SO threads: "How many posts are improved after negative criticism" vs. "How many are improved after positive criticism". I hope that kindness rules the day but I don't actually know if it does. After all I'm admitting that I changed my post after you snarked at me not before ;)
– Jonathan ElkinsMar 12 at 7:45

@Jonathan In this case the post was not improved after positive criticism and the asker instead was rude, and I responded with snark. I think that's quite common. Obviously I should have walked away, but I think that there is value in understanding why posters here sometimes resort to snark. As far as posters feeling welcome goes, I think that can be taken too far. For sure we should be nice to good faith askers. But do we really need to make bad faith askers feel welcome?
– David HeffernanMar 12 at 7:51

Well if the asker was rude after positive criticism then I'm entirely with you, there is no redeeming them. You did your best and were met with rudeness. I completely understand a "human response" in that context.
– Jonathan ElkinsMar 12 at 7:58

@Jonathan It's a very understandable human response but it achieves nothing and weakens any arguments. So walking away is the right thing to do. I'm still struggling to learn how to do that consistently.
– David HeffernanMar 12 at 8:02

Well I wish you the best. Inspite of your snark I appreciate that high quality content providers like yourself are here on SO. And for my part I'll try not to take the snark so personally, looking past it to see what I'm missing.
– Jonathan ElkinsMar 12 at 8:29

To me this blog post provided an interesting indication that problem with snarky comments can't be reliably handled without addressing the problem of low quality questions flooding the site.

Particular example that made me feel that way is "And this is tagged Javascript why?" (it is removed from current version of blog article but wayback machine shows that it was there from the very start).

I've seen this example discussed in at least five prior answers and all fairly reliably suggested that it can be perceived as snarky. For the sake of precision, some also reasonably point that in some cases this wording could be caused by mere lack of English fluency, but this only means that it would be discriminatory to punish commenter for unintended snark (note that snark would still be there and better be dealt with).

What stroke me is that I regularly observe similar comments in my close reviews and, which is maybe even more interesting, these tend to be posted on particularly poor questions,

I've seen an answer from moderator that comments like that could be flagged and deleted, which sounds like a good approach in general but I can't see how it can work in cases like described above. Because, if you think of it, even if moderator deletes one comment in such a question, it can (and most probably will) be reposted by some other user, especially if question uses highly active tag(s) like javascript.

Sad thing is, even phrasing comment in more friendly / neutral tone is unlikely to help, because in questions like that it would be practically doomed to trigger a snarky "follow-up" from someone else, hey @commenter don't you see that lazy asker simply spam-tagged their homework dump to make sure that it annoys as many people as possible.

Another suggestion I've seen for this example was to edit out the tag. It also sounds good on a surface. You can even ask yourself a question, why folks even bother commenting when edit seems to be obvious path of least resistance... or is it really?

I for one tend to abstain from edits like that because if you look closer, removal of the tag would fail to make it really better. I think that many (maybe most) active editors would also feel that way. And even users under 2K who may be tempted by a chance to get +2 rep are at risk of getting their suggestions rejected as explained eg here.

So it's kind of a stalemate, the tag looks clearly superfluous but its removal looks superfluous as well. No wonder that it adds to frustration and tends to cause snarky comments.

Summing up above, it is hard to imagine how things can improve while such question is visible, especially if it is open (closed questions probably draw less attention).

might not be helpful, but certainly needs to be said...
– mxmissileJul 10 '18 at 16:44

27

@Abyx thank you so much for demonstrating the absurdity.
– 1984Jul 10 '18 at 17:14

9

Exactly. We don't need to bow down to jerks. It's the same logic around 10x engineers - if they're jerks, then nothing they contribute compensates for the vast # of people they drive away.
– AnilRedshiftJul 11 '18 at 5:57

34

Upvoted. Stack Overflow seems to be focused on a short-time goal, to maximize the number of people using the platform. However, not every user is equal, and this policy aims to raise the number of users by increasing the influx of new, inexperienced users who contribute low-quality questions. In the medium term, that chases away the people who contribute the high-value answers, and in the long term that turns Stack Overflow into the new ExpertsExchange.
– MSaltersJul 11 '18 at 8:47

5

While people may or may not agree on the direction SO is being led, this post is plainly assuming bad faith. Please stop.
– Passer ByJul 11 '18 at 18:18

The thing is, nobody is defending such comments. People are defending these comments here. The fact that there are worse comments does not make these good.
– Nicol BolasJul 11 '18 at 23:06

@NicolBolas a lof of people (myself included) don't see much of a difference.
– PureferretJul 12 '18 at 14:49

8

@Pureferret Wait, you don't see a difference between, "Epic fail" and "The code you posted cannot yield this result. Please post the real code if you hope to get any help."? That's, frankly, absurd. One is nothing but a snide jab with no real value at all, neither describing a problem, nor how that problem can be addressed, and one is a professional and polite statement describing a problem with the question and how to fix it.
– ServyJul 12 '18 at 15:44

@Servy I originally posted this picture because I don't feel that "The code you posted cannot yield this result. Please post the real code if you hope to get any help." is an unwelcoming comment - my example is probably too extreme, but I don't think the examples that we're displaying above are properly capturing the truly snarky, rude unwelcoming comments that plague this site.
– dwironyJul 12 '18 at 16:25

@NicolBolas Actually, the poster of the "Epic fail" comment was defending it :)
– dwironyJul 12 '18 at 16:30

1

@servy no, that's an unfair example of what were discussing. From the op's post, this is closer to 'epic fail': "This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. " It's not the same tone, but the message is equally unwelcoming.
– PureferretJul 12 '18 at 17:26

@Pureferret It's not an unfair example. You said that the image above is the same as the quotes from the question.
– ServyJul 12 '18 at 17:30

1

@Pureferret As to the other comment that you'd prefer to compare it to, that comment states that what they said was wrong, what the correct statement is, and what they need to be doing differently to resolve their problem. That's all useful information. Them stating that it's a waste of their time for their advice not to be followed is not being rude, it's not insulting for its own sake, like "epic fail" is, rather it's a statement that if the helpful advice providing a solution to the problem isn't going to be followed, help will no longer be given. That's all radically different.
– ServyJul 12 '18 at 17:31

@servy it is stated factually and delivers facts. I'm not questioning that. I didn't even say it was rude. It is not welcoming though. Yes, to be welcoming you have to go out of your way, and yes it requires more effort. It's going above and beyond. Just stating facts is below the minimum desired to be welcoming.
– PureferretJul 12 '18 at 19:32

@Pureferret If you want to have a place to socialize with people, and exchange pleasantries, and otherwise have a community with a low signal to noise ratio because it emphasizes pleasantries over useful programming information, then there are lots of social networks out there that attempt to deliver on that. SO is not designed to do those things. It's designed to be a place where you ask clear, low noise, questions, and get clear, low noise, responses. Users are expected to be professionals that can handle formal communications like that.
– ServyJul 12 '18 at 19:39

1

@Servy There is no reason why Stack Overflow can't have a healthy balance of both of those.
– dwironyJul 12 '18 at 19:54

@dwirony Yes, there is actually. You can't have a low noise, formal, direct, and professional environment and also say that people who provide helpful, on topic, concise technical information aren't welcome because they need to go out of their way and spend considerable effort to obfuscate all of their communications with additional language there for the sole purpose of socializing.
– ServyJul 12 '18 at 19:59

1

@Servy And that's not what I'm saying - nobody has to go out of their way, if you want to maintain a low noise/professional mantra then that's fine by me, but if you're going to be critical of people that throw an occasional pleasantry in there then that's wrong and we're back to the problems of an unwelcoming environment on this site - and you keep mentioning the professional world like everything is done by the books, but it's not and a lot of interactions extend beyond a formal/direct demeanor - it's how people build relationships...
– dwironyJul 12 '18 at 20:09

1

@dwirony "And that's not what I'm saying" That's what Pureferret said, and you said you supported it. The site already does a lot to actively prevent socialization. They're automatically removed from posts, and encouraged to be edited out if they are not filtered, for example. It's a very explicit goal of the site that they're trying to prevent such behaviors. They want people to find the information they're looking for, and not have to look through someone else's off topic casual conversation to find it.
– ServyJul 12 '18 at 20:38

1

@Pureferret But you were very explicit about the fact that you aren't expecting a negligible effort. You said, "Yes, to be welcoming you have to go out of your way, and yes it requires more effort. It's going above and beyond. Just stating facts is below the minimum desired to be welcoming." So according to you people need to spend considerable effort, going above and beyond expectations (which is of course entirely contradictory, you can't say that the minimum expectations are well above the minimum expectations), in order to be welcoming.
– ServyJul 12 '18 at 21:44

You propose to routinely edit comments to remove tone, etc. Don't do it man. Comments have no publicly visible edit history, and as far as I can tell no notice on being edited. Editing comments besides strikethrough should be reserved for great issues and rarely done.

You wanna hear people cry censorship, edit comments. So 1984 is being a pain and his post deserved massive downvotes. But the pain has a point buried within his rant. Stuffing words into people's mouths is not acceptible.

There are three alternatives: let the crap fester, remove the comment entirely, or remove the bad part of it. Letting it fester is not a good solution. And people have started to "cry censorship" to the point where the word is starting to lose its impact and meaning.
– Nicol BolasJul 11 '18 at 23:02

@NicolBolas: People are proposing things like "But don’t do that. Fix your design." -> "So you'd probably be better off revisiting the design to see if there's a way to avoid them." which is none of the choices you gave.
– JoshuaJul 11 '18 at 23:38

Yes, I think those quotes can be interpretted as unwelcoming. Perhaps you interpet tone differently than those who find it unwelcoming?

We can nitpick how to word things all day long. Fix your feelings. Meaning, if you're angry, upset, frustrated, annoyed, that will come out in your writing. If you feel positively toward others, your tone will follow. I suspect all of the comments had negative emotion when written. That being said, here's a detailed (arugably nitpicky) explanation of the tone:

Calling the comments "allegedly" unwelcoming is telling. It can convey an attitude that you know it all. Of course you may not think that. But since you didn't say something like "I'm having a hard time understanding why these are unwelcoming; can you help me understand?" which emphasizes that you're trying to learn, maybe you don't perceive tone the same way some others do. And if you don't perceive tone the same way, no wonder you don't see how they're unwelcoming to some.

I will break down the unwelcoming I saw in the quotes:

“No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.”

It's unwelcoming to call a social interaction a waste. (It's also hypocritical - why continue if it's truly a waste.)

When you say "You won’t listen to my advice" you're making a statement about the other person. Something you don't know. That's aggressive. Try talking about yourself, instead. Also, suggest you change. "I feel misunderstood. How can I explain things better?"

People learn all sorts of ways. People will make progress their way, most likely. It may just be slower. Something similar that's more welcoming: "I believe you will make progress faster if you do it this way. Here's why." You've qualified it as a belief instead of absolute. You're acknowledging their process works (instead of inability to make progress); there's just a (probably) better way.

“And this is tagged Javascript why?”

You said second example aside; skipping.

“Also, any time you have enumerated columns, you can be sure that something’s gone very, very wrong with your design. That said, you’re probably after LEAST(). But don’t do that. Fix your design.”

Rather than pointing out weaknesses in the existing, point out strengths of the alternative. That's positive. Also answer the question, first. It can be slightly condescending to answer a tangential question before answering OP's actual question. The tone is demeaning with "you can be sure" and "very, very". Here's a more welcoming alternative: "To solve your immediate problem, you should be able to use LEAST(). However when you enumerate columns, there's usually a way to improve the design, at least if the goal is to [insert purpose of design change here]. Here's how to do that." Explicitly mentioning the design purpose along with the design is less dogmatic and shows the subjectivity in architecture.

“For the last time, use the serial number code and replace kIOPlatformSerialNumberKey with kIOPlatformUUIDKey“

"For the last time" can be omitted; it's only unwelcoming.

“Please provide a full compilable sample if you want anyone to be able to help you: https://stackoverflow.com/help/mcve. I have already told how you can bind to the property. If you can’t make it work, you are doing something wrong.”

Again, talking about others can be aggressive. Consider "In order to help you we need a compilable sample." "I have already told you" can be omitted; it only contributes to being unwelcome. Sometimes the fault isn't the user. So "if you can't make it work" could be better worded as "if it doesn't work". It's possible that they're doing everything right, but there's, say, a hardware error. So "you are doing something wrong" could be better worded as "you are probably doing something wrong". Both changes make the sentence more welcoming. However, the idea may be omitted; I don't see much value. A better idea may be, "if it doesn't work, let us know what you did so we can help further".

"For the last time" can be omitted; it's only unwelcoming. While I can agree with this in general, I have run across people who see the "Do the X with the fizzbar" comment--posted six times--and respond with "I did the Y to the foobizz, but it still doesn't work." Not here on SO, but I have run across these people. When you've told them six times what to do, they still haven't done it, and still think they're entitled to being helped. What would happen on SO is there would be six, identical comments, and they'd get flagged for removal under one reason or another (possibly even "rude").
– Draco18sJul 11 '18 at 23:37

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@Draco18s That's a good point. All of these quotes were taken out of context. With context, welcoming or not may differ.
– Words Like JaredJul 11 '18 at 23:42

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Heck, "welcoming" varies by the reader. The same sentence that to me looks kind and helpful can--to a plausible but hypothetical reader--could be patronizing or pedantic. Whereas a message, devoid of overly flowery language, is clear and to the point might be viewed as brusk. I encourage readers to view the definitions of each linked word to fully understand my point.
– Draco18sJul 12 '18 at 3:38

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When you say "You won’t listen to my advice" you're making a statement about the other person. Something you don't know. That's aggressive. Wow we seem to have a very low threshold for aggression
– an earwigJul 12 '18 at 13:22

@00 "we" - I think I see what you did there. I'm having trouble understanding why you don't find "you" aggressive - could you elaborate? Aggressive may be the wrong word. What I'm describing is related to I-statements vs you-statements.
– Words Like JaredJul 12 '18 at 14:33

@Draco18s I agree. It's tough to get tone right for everyone. (I assume I did a poor job in my post, given my down-votes.) To your point, I try to adapt to my audience. If someone appears terse I may take clear and to the point. etc.
– Words Like JaredJul 12 '18 at 14:38

If I could downvote your answer a 2nd time after your last edit, I would. Your point came across quite clear in the earlier versions of your answer. But the amateurish psychological advice you give about "fixing" feelings is nothing I appreciate.
– user9455968Jul 12 '18 at 20:16

None at all. If I want psychological advice I make an appointment with a professional. And this will not be anywhere on or near the SO/SE network.
– user9455968Jul 12 '18 at 20:22

@LutzHorn I think I follow your reasoning - discussing feelings is not appropriate on SE. I'm trying to understand how to answer better: why else did you give -1?
– Words Like JaredJul 12 '18 at 20:27

In the 2nd version I especially did not like this: 'the calling the comments "allegedly" unwelcoming is telling - that conveys an attitude that you know'. I don't think we should make diagnosis about others attitudes or character based on SO/SE posts.
– user9455968Jul 12 '18 at 20:31

@LutzHorn I wasn't trying to say OP had that atittude. I said OP came across with (conveys) that attitude. The whole point of being welcoming is how you come across; my answer was largely addressing that - how you come across, not how you actually are. Does that make sense? Was that not clear?
– Words Like JaredJul 12 '18 at 20:35

These type of comments just feel like you are patronizing the person or making he or she feels like she did something really bad. Some people are more sensitive and that's okay. We should be more inclusive, because if people feels welcomed, they are more likely to pursue programming and who knows, maybe they will answer your question one day?

Any person in the world can choose to take criticism of their work personally, that does not mean we should stop criticising people's work. It means they should stop taking it personally.
– Tiny GiantJul 18 '18 at 3:58

I completely disagree with the OP. The vast majority of the examples that they used (and defended), while they may have provided some sort of answer to the question, were extremely sassy. If a commenter can't control their tone and respect the OP, they shouldn't comment at all. The point of this site is to help people, and even to provide constructive criticism. Not to outright scold them. You're not their parents, so don't act like it. If they choose not to accept your original advice, let it be; don't resort to insulting them.

"sassy", "scold", "insulting". No, nothing of this is in these comments, neither in the original nor the modified ones.
– user9455968Jul 14 '18 at 19:00

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In response to @LutzHorn here is the first example that was used: “No. As it stands the C# marshaler is going to call CoTaskMemFree to deallocate the memory. This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work find out how the string is allocated you can’t make progress.” Now you're telling me those last 3 sentences are necessary?
– AndrewJul 14 '18 at 19:07

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Necessary? Maybe not. But sassy, scold, insulting? No. The quoted commend obviously is out of context. There has been an attempt to help the person asking the question. The last three sentences express the frustration of the commenter about the unwillingness of the asker to be helped.
– user9455968Jul 14 '18 at 19:12

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And as I stated, if you try to help someone and they don't accept your advice just walk away. You have no stake in the matter and don't benefit if the poster succeeds in solving their problem. There is no reason to get "frustrated" at someone for not accepting your suggestions.
– AndrewJul 14 '18 at 20:59

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@LutzHorn, Try saying This is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. aloud to your colleague next time he asks you a question. If this is the way you communicate, even if it's tit for tat, it's not likely to go down well in most professional organisations. You can argue all day on the correct epithet to describe such language.
– jppJul 16 '18 at 9:52

@jpp A colleague of a programmers in a professional organization would probably not ask a question or behave so ignorant that the asked person would think about commenting like this. Part of being a professional is knowing what and how to ask.
– user9455968Jul 16 '18 at 10:02

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@LutzHorn, As I said, "tit for tat" isn't condoned in most professional organisations. You seem to think it is.
– jppJul 16 '18 at 10:20

@jpp No. I think that in a professional environment question quality will be much higher that what we encouter daily on SO. You will usually not be asked to solve some lazy pupils homework assignment in the workplace. Also, colleagues will not refuse help as it is common on SO.
– user9455968Jul 16 '18 at 10:25

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@LutzHorn Actually, as much as I may have agreed with that statement in the past, I have seen recently that just because someone is in a professional organization doesn't make them knowledgeable. People ask dumb questions, nothing you can do about it.
– AndrewJul 16 '18 at 12:17

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Yes, we're not their parents. So we should be holding them accountable to our quality standards. We are not obligated to help them in any sense, so if users want help, it would be beneficial to themselves to actually follow our rules and work with the community, not against it.
– fbueckertJul 16 '18 at 17:57

"No. As it stands this is now rather a waste of time. You won’t listen to my advice. If you won’t work out how to relate to other human beings, you can't make progress.

And this time you're answering questions on Stack Overflow, you're doing so voluntarily. If you get frustrated, walk away. Nobody is forcing your labor out of you. But don’t do that. Fix your attitude.

For the last time, this is a website for voluntarily answering questions, and it's silly to expect everybody else to be as smart as you, even more so to get so up in arms about politeness guidelines from a post on the website's own blog that you write home about it.

The idea that people can be so busy that they can't take the time to communicate kindly is funny, because these same people are voluntarily answering questions on Stack Overflow, and some are then writing lengthy arguments about how they should be allowed to be rude as they do so, and posting them in Meta.

It costs you nothing to be kind, and common courtesy is not some sort of limited resource.

It's not about giving people a warm fuzzy feeling, it's about letting nontraditional learners, women, people of color, and non-native speakers of English into the industry, which'll never happen if people maintain an elitist, technocratic, meritocratic attitude toward question askers on Stack Overflow.

common courtesy is not some sort of limited resource - Time and the number of characters that are available for comments are limited, though. The issue of "women and people of color" was basically dismantled (or never even properly justified, to begin with). When "user3246324" writes a crappy question, it will not be welcome (in fact, I'm pretty sure that a user called "BlueEyedSweetie21" might even have some bonus here, but I won't claim that without evidence). I think this whole topic is not technical enough to be discussed here, but we cannot help being exposed to it. That's annoying.
– Marco13Jul 11 '18 at 22:39

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"The idea that people can be so busy that they can't take the time to communicate kindly is funny, because these same people are voluntarily answering questions on stack overflow, and some are then writing lengthy arguments about how they should be allowed to be rude as they do so, and posting them in Meta." Here's the thing, though: these people pride themselves on how altruistic they are to be putting so much time into making things better for anyone else who wants to provide good answers and moderate the site well. You can critique this, but insulting it is unwise.
– Nathan TuggyJul 12 '18 at 3:40

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Unwise? I don't care. Also, pride yourself in how altruistic you are? Did I just read that sentence?
– Matthew HineaJul 12 '18 at 5:12

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If you actively don't care about making an effective argument, there is no good reason for anyone to listen to the arguments you do make.
– Nathan TuggyJul 12 '18 at 6:38

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I find this answer condescending and unwelcoming
– an earwigJul 12 '18 at 13:24

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@NathanTuggy: What you've said here is essentially entitlement. That some people feel that, as "altruistic" curators, they are entitled to be as sassy, snarky, or jerky as they want. It's like saying that being snarky towards poor people at a soup kitchen is OK if you're the one handing them soup; such people shouldn't expect better treatment from volunteers. Such a position deserves insults, not reasoned critique.
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 17:39

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Would you say that getting snarky still isn't okay if the people getting free soup started demanding golden spoons?
– Ansgar WiechersJul 12 '18 at 17:48

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I don't think people generally get snarky until it's obvious the asker either doesn't feel like researching the issue themselves ("please write this code for me") or they don't want to take the advice given to them by other users. You say the community should show some common courtesy to new users - how about new users show the community some common courtesy in return?
– Mage XyJul 12 '18 at 17:50

@NicolBolas: I deliberately phrased my original description in a way that would make it clear that it was mistaken and even somewhat self-deceptive. But treating this position, or any wrong position that is the result of extremely common human psychology, as deserving nothing but insults is, again, unwise. If you can't explain what's wrong with someone believing they are being unselfish while actually being selfish, you should allow the many writers of the past who have managed this (I am thinking of C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters here) to do the job instead.
– Nathan TuggyJul 12 '18 at 17:54

@NicolBolas: Consider it from another angle. Suppose I have spotted some arrogant, entitled, rude user posting loudly on Meta about how badly a certain group of users acts (and by extension, how good they are that they don't do that). Does it help anything if I then skewer that user with insults, recognizing their pride and hypocrisy, and wanting to be sure everyone knows that they are Not Cool, or Unwelcoming, or otherwise disapproved by All Right-Thinking People? No. I have simply taken their same error a step further.
– Nathan TuggyJul 12 '18 at 18:00

@NathanTuggy: "If you can't explain what's wrong with someone believing they are being unselfish while actually being selfish" If you have to explain basic courtesy to someone, they're probably not going to understand it. I've tried to explain why some comment or other was insulting or inappropriate, but they just don't get it. So I don't bother. Also, there's a difference between "deserving of insults" and actually choosing to deliver those insults. The latter is not acceptable, but the former?
– Nicol BolasJul 12 '18 at 18:26

Not sure why this is getting downvotes- They're right, at least about snark and how best to handle it from oneself. We don't need snark, especially on a Q&A site that's supposed to be used by professionals. =/
– KendraJul 10 '18 at 15:09

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I dowvoted because this "take 10 deep breaths; in through the nose, out through the mouth" is not welcoming. It is patronizing.
– user9455968Jul 10 '18 at 15:10

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@LutzHorn Actually... It's sound advice. Can you explain what feels patronizing about it? Deep breathing is a commonly advised way to calm yourself down, and doing so before posting a comment is never really a bad idea. If spoiledgoods knows what's wrong with it, they can reword it.
– KendraJul 10 '18 at 15:11

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@LutzHorn good, it was intentional. You feel patronized by my comment, like the human on the receiving-end of these unwelcoming comments.
– ChumiestBucketJul 10 '18 at 15:11

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@spoiledgoods I like how being welcoming is only important when you're talking to someone asking a low quality question. Whenever you're talking to anyone else being intentionally rude is just fine.
– ServyJul 10 '18 at 15:13

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The quoted comment is completely factual and actually good advice. On the other hand, this answer is patronising as ####.
– Lightness Races in OrbitJul 10 '18 at 15:17

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@spoiledgoods: The advice is: start listening to advice (or why show up at all) and follow the instructions given in order to make progress.
– Lightness Races in OrbitJul 10 '18 at 15:20

This is a great example of new users (who have basically not helped anyone on the site) being held to a lower standard than established users (who have helped hundreds of thousands or millions of people). @spoiledgoods openly said in this comment, that their answer was designed to offend and insult other users. They are explicitly trying to be unwelcoming...
– stiemannkj1Jul 10 '18 at 15:24

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...I'm doubtful that @spoiledgoods's flagrant disregard for the rules will cause SO (the company) to post a blog about how established users are being abused by newbies and how that needs to stop.
– stiemannkj1Jul 10 '18 at 15:26

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@spoiledgoods, it's not elitism to hold you to the same standard as everyone else. Of course, it's common sense to treat established users better that newbies (heck, that's exactly what the reputation system does) because established users help 10x-1000x more people than you and me.
– stiemannkj1Jul 10 '18 at 15:34

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@spoiledgoods, I'm saying that it wasn't a personal attack to say you haven't helped anyone. I'm saying that SO should care more about keeping its elite users happy than placating new users or even established users (because the elites are much more important to the site). And I'm saying that at the very least new users like yourself should be held to the same standard as elite users, old users, and established users.
– stiemannkj1Jul 10 '18 at 16:18

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@spoiledgoods I think it's kind of hypocritical for you to say that seniors want to be held at a different standard, when you yourself post something unwelcoming and snarky purposefully and think it's fine. If you don't want double standards, then maybe act like you expect everybody else to act? :/...
– PatriceJul 10 '18 at 16:54

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"good, it was intentional. You feel patronized by my comment, like the human on the receiving-end of these unwelcoming comments. " So it's fine for you to engage in that because you share the position of the moderators? This policy is unworkable.
– 1984Jul 10 '18 at 17:15

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completely blown away by what people get offended by these days...
– mxmissileJul 12 '18 at 17:11